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I've just been using my gardener's yearbook thread to look back at what we were doing in previous years. I started to feel a bit behind, but reminded myself it is still only the 1st today !

February for me is the month of first sowings. The greenhouse should be ready (but isn't quite !). The early sowings need to go in - for me that's indoor tomatoes, peppers, chilies of course, leeks and maybe onions. I say maybe, because I just might be tempted to try direct sowing once more, in the allotment where I've had a good layer of mulch on top of the ground over winter. May just be able to make a tilth there before it is too late - no chance on the native clay soil, which is too heavy and wet until it is too late to sow !

Oh, and salad trays - with "salad" in the broadest sense -baby leaf leaves of the usual lettuce and rocket, but also all the slightly out of date brassica can make sprouts to use like cress. I've got a collection of the black plastic trays from supermarket veg for this, now that I know they don't get recycled anyway, they may as well get a second use !

As I was harvesting lovely carrots from the polytunnel yesterday evening I realised that previously I have sown my first carrot seeds in there before the end of January so I need to get into gear.A few sunny days could give me the incentive to get going but we don't seem to be getting many of those.

I think most of my growing may be confined to the tunnel this year. We're getting connected to mains water and the trench for the supply pipes will be coming through my two plots of raised beds so I won't really be able to do anything until that's done. It's not altogether a bad thing because my outdoor growing areas need a bit of a revamp anyway. The fencing stakes and gateposts are starting to rot as is the wood of my raised beds and the paths need some attention too. I need to rethink my outdoor growing anyway because of the success of the polytunnel - it was so productive last year that a lot of outdoor veg got wasted because I just didn't need it all. I have also been thinking about a fruit cage as the raiding behaviour of the blackbirds now seems to be hereditary. I think my fruit bushes are losing their oomph too - they've mostly been there, and very productive, for nearly 20 years.

I have ordered 5 autumn raspberries called Julia J for my new raspberry bed. I have been reading about getting two crops from autumn rasps so decided not to bother with summer ones. My old Autumn Bliss will perhaps benefit from some tlc too.Pleased with my fruit cage, I actually got crops from my blueberries last year.Sometimes an enforced re-vamp is a good thing, isn't it Ploshkin? I have my first flock of chickens to thank for my garden's partial re-design!Speaking of which, we're getting a daily egg now and some days two from my two girls :-)

Thanks to 'no dig' all my veg plots are ready and waiting including three that haven't been in production for years. This is the first time in my entire gardening career that I have been in this happy position. Due to the time saved, I have been able to rejig the greenhouse to give myself more growing space, and I'm really looking forward to the new season.

The only fly in the ointment are some awkwardly placed holidays - I am going to have to consider when I sow seeds very carefully.

I know what you mean about awkwardly placed holidays. Having a teenage son, we are still confined to school holidays - the obvious ones interfering with the peak of the growing season, or meaning that you miss the best of the harvest ! Still, I know that time passes quickly, and the years when he still want to do stuff with his old Dad may not last a lot longer. Although, if he is anything like his cousins he'll still be using us for free holidays for some years to come.

As for having a trench dug through your plot - my allotment could do with a digger through it to get rid of the neighbour's couch grass that has infested my Autumn Bliss raspberries ! Current plan is to take some shots with a bit of root and pot them up to grow on as replacement plants, then clear the whole bed, digging a trench to put a barrier down the side to stop the couch returning.